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Early Influences

I started playing guitar when I was 7 years old and haven't looked back since. After I had some facility with the guitar I started listening to a lot, and I mean a lot, of progressive rock and fusion. My early influences were early Genesis, Gentle Giant, King Crimson, and of course ELP and Yes. I also listened to a LOT of Frank Zappa and even got to play with him in 1978 (I will write a post about that sometime, but it is R rated). I loved Mahavishnu Orchestra and that got me into Paco DeLucia and Flamenco music along with the Phrygian major mode!

Hello.
This is Jon Griffin, and I am here today to talk about a concept that most rock guitars probably won't know about. If you've studied a lot of jazz you may be familiar. But they're called kernel chords. At least that's the way I was taught. They're very simple. They're just chords with the root, the third, and the seventh of minor, major, or dominant.

I worked this little guitar arrangement of When You Wish Upon a Star for my friends son a few years ago. It's not too difficult if you have some experience, but there are a few stretches and techniques you may need to practice.

This is also a good example of how different jazz guitarists think versus most rock and pop players. Notice there are no bar chords and voices lead in a logical way.

I plan on doing some more lessons on chord melody, so if you have any comments or suggestions, please leave a comment.